Government Technology - May 2008 - (Page 33)

9 percent in fiscal 2007 to just 3 percent or 4 percent in fiscal 2008. The state’s executive leadership has placed a premium on enhancing productivity and efficiency to offset lost revenue. Cummiskey said that challenge can be met with some effort and ingenuity. “We try to find ways to create programs that can benefit in a shared services kind of environment,” he said. “Things like project management certification programs or ways of expanding Web conferencing tools for better efficiencies and cost savings. That’s what we’re working on: how to put programs in place that will benefit all 115 agencies, boards and commissions in a way that is smart going forward.” Is California Still Golden? In California, dire budget projections have been a topic of discussion for the last decade. This time the state may be in a genuine budget crisis, with a $14.5 billion deficit estimate for 2008. However, leadership in the state’s Department of Technology Services has remained strong, and new CIO Teri Takai is confident her agency can help the state through its economic woes. Takai, former Michigan CIO, is just a few months into her new position, having taken the reins from Clark Kelso, who now serves as the federal receiver overseeing health care for California’s prison system. “Clearly we are spending dollars on IT, and we have to make sure we’re looking at those dollars and channeling those to the highestpriority projects,” Takai said. “The second thing we want to do is take an enterprise look at what we’re doing because it could very well be that, if several organizations work together to put an application out, there may be a way to use the monies more effectively.” For Takai, dodging the budget crunch is all about IT optimization, which is another strategy Eggers has consistently championed. California capitol building in Sacramento PHOTO BY KRIS PFEIFER Chris Cummiskey, CIO, Arizona Bill Eggers, Global Director, Deloitte Research-Public Sector Cummiskey has additional strategies to help his agency thrive even when budgets are lean. Enterprise licensing arrangements, for example, are simple ways to cut costs. Instead of the state’s 60-plus agencies purchasing software licenses on their own, Cummiskey’s enterprise approach generates significant savings. Cummiskey also is looking seriously at service-oriented architecture (SOA). Though transitioning to SOA isn’t an immediate solution for current issues, it could position the state to meet future challenges while continuing to deliver services. The budget crisis may not be as dire as some make it out to be, but budget cuts will be unavoidable because many states are feeling a pinch. However, there are good and bad ways to approach these reductions. Ross and Cummiskey contend that traditional, across-the-board budget cuts do more harm than good. Bill Eggers, the global director of Deloitte Research-Public Sector, has long argued this point and notes that sweeping cuts don’t take into account IT’s ability to help the enterprise do more with less. “IT budgets shouldn’t be exempted from budget cuts, but there’s a right way and a wrong way to cut IT,” said Eggers. “The wrong way — but also the most popular way — is across-the-board cuts. As with a starvation diet, such slash-and-burn cutbacks are usually undone as soon as tax revenues begin flowing back into government coffers. Instead governments should take a more tactical approach by driving out excess costs and creating additional value by transforming their IT cost base, structure, priorities and infrastructure.” In Arizona, Cummiskey said Gov. Janet Napolitano has adhered to the strategy Eggers described. Instead of cutting all agencies’ budgets without regard to their capability, Arizona’s governor opted for a more exacting approach. “The governor has actually promoted a balanced approach to bridge to better economic times,” Cummiskey said, “which is to say some agency cuts and reductions are targeted, not across-the-board, and really go in surgically and look at areas where we can realistically make reductions.” 33

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Government Technology - May 2008

Government Technology - May 2008 Contents Point of View The Last Mile Big Picture On the Scene Four Questions for … Turning Over a New Leaf Crash Diet Budget Blues? Failing Grade? Running the Numbers The 311 Report High-Tech Corrections How It Works Spectrum Two Cents Products Personal Computing Signal: Noise

Government Technology - May 2008

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